Strangers On The Road To Heaven
by ULTRA SONIC
Summary: After dying at the hands of his son, Han Solo finds himself on the path to the netherworld of the Force. However, he also encounters someone who turns out to be the last person he expected to have as his guide. One-shot, Spoilers for TFA.


AN: It's amazing how you can get an idea within a few weeks after watching episode 7.

Now just so everyone knows, this does have spoilers for Force Awakens, so if you have not seen it yet, DON'T READ this until after the fact, otherwise it's not going to make any sense. But I would imagine that after several weeks if everyone on the planet hasn't already seen it, then shame on them.

* * *

His vision was nothing but darkness.

Or at least, that's what it felt like at first to Han Solo.

For most of his young life he wasn't the kind of guy to believe in superstitious things, or as he once told Old Ben Kenobi "Hokey religions", but ever since meeting that crazy old fossil, as well as Luke, Leia and everything that followed after…well, one could say that Han had in a way become converted. Or at least as much as a non-Force sensitive could be.

But even that didn't mean that he was immune to witnessing the Dark Side's poisonous grip firsthand. First it had been Vader, and then…his and Leia's son Ben.

How a scumbag like Snoke managed to get his claws onto him Han still couldn't figure out, but even now as he tried to open his eyes after falling who-knows-how-many-miles, Han still found himself holding on to the hope that his son was still in there.

 _Guess I picked up the same habit Luke did._ Han thought sardonically.

"Are you all right?" Asked a voice.

Han then tried to lift his head but to no avail, but then he saw what seemed to be a cloaked figure whose face was obscured by a hood come up to him and offer a hand. Wanting to get up on his own but still needing help Han then accepted and as he did he then found himself getting his strength back as the stranger helped the former smuggler/Rebel hero back to his feet.

"Thanks, whoever you are." Han said to the stranger.

"You're welcome." Replied the stranger with a small smile.

It was then that Han then realized that his own voice didn't sound old. Curious he then looked at his hands and noticed they didn't have the spots he had gotten in the recent decade.

"Would this help?" Asked the stranger as he raised his right hand and waved it slightly, causing a makeshift mirror to appear in front of Han, showing the smuggler that he was back in his physical prime again, dark hair and all.

It was then that Han took notice of his surroundings which wasn't much, just a never-ending expanse of white-gray along with his new companion who stood out with his brown cloak/hood and an outfit that looked similar to Old Ben's, but with a grey-white look to them, as well as what looked like a dark purple under tunic.

"Where…where am I?"

"This is the pathway – or as I like to call it – the doorway to the netherworld of the Force." Replied the stranger. "Granted, it looks like it's a long way, but it's not."

Han then looked from side to side and saw nothing, but if his new companion said it was – and it looked like he knew how this whole thing worked – then the scoundrel didn't have much choice but to go with what the stranger told him.

"Looks different than what you thought?" Asked the stranger.

"Well…to be honest I never really thought about it." Han replied. "Plus I remember once telling an old man it was just a hokey religion – all simple tricks and nonsense."

The stranger then laughed. "Yeah, he did say you told him that." He remarked. "I remember his beloved Satine getting quite a kick out of it when she heard it herself. Well, besides me and my angel anyway."

Han's face then contorted in surprise. "Wait, you know who I'm talkin' about?"

"Of course," remarked the stranger. "You know him as Old Ben, but his real name is Obi-Wan Kenobi."

Han then stepped closer as he tried to make out who was underneath that hood, but somehow the face still remained obscured, aside from the mouth and jaw.

"Who are you?" Asked the former smuggler.

The stranger then sighed before slowly bringing his hands up the sides of his hood and lifting it back, revealing a face that surprised Han. Instead of an old wizened person, it was the face of a tall young man who looked like he was in his mid-twenties with dark blonde hair that reached down to the base of his neck and piercing sapphire eyes.

But what was really surprising was that although the stranger looked young, his eyes conveyed anything but that. In fact, as Han looked at the man closely he could see all kinds of feelings in those eyes. Chief among them was the feelings of kindness and peace, but also a great sense of remorse. Why that was the case Han couldn't figure out, but as he noticed this he could also see that the man bore an uncanny resemblance to Luke.

"You…look familiar somehow." Han remarked.

The stranger sighed again, knowing that there was no point in trying to hide it anymore.

"Captain Solo, you see me as I really am…but without that iron-lung of a suit, or the mask."

At first Han didn't know what the stranger meant, but then as he played back the latter part of the man's sentence in his head a moment of realization began to crystalize, followed by a feeling of outright horror as he then began to step away from the man, now knowing _who_ it was he was talking to.

"Vader," Han hissed.

"Actually, it's Anakin Skywalker." Anakin corrected.

"And that's different, how?" Han asked rhetorically.

"Solo, please calm down. I'm not here to hurt you." Anakin insisted.

"Forgive me if I don't take your word for it." Han snapped sarcastically as he tried to reach for his blaster, only to realize it wasn't there.

"This ain't a passage to heaven, is it? It's a gateway to hell!" Han shouted as he charged at the taller man. Fortunately Anakin was able to dodge him easily.

"Solo, please! Just hear me out…!" Anakin pleaded.

"Hear _you_ out?! Boy, and I thought your sense of humor was only the twisted kind. You seriously want me to hear out how you still managed to pollute mine and Leia's son?!" Han raged as he still tried to take a swing at Anakin. "Are you even dead at all?!"

"I know what happened to Ben." Anakin said, anguish already leaking out through his voice. "And believe me, it was just as heartbreaking for me and Padme to witness."

"You don't know a _damn_ thing about heartbreak." Han retorted. "Not a damn thing."

Han then tried for a right cross, only for Anakin to grab it and use the momentum to bring the smuggler down on the ground.

"Actually, I know more about that than you realize." Anakin said as he kept a firm yet not harsh grip on the smuggler's wrist, a look of sorrow etched on his face.

Letting go of the smuggler's wrist, Anakin then got up and stepped back a bit, allowing Han to get up on his own since the former knew the latter wouldn't want any assistance from him. Not that Anakin blamed Han for the hostility.

Getting up on his own, Han then glared at Anakin as the former watched for any sudden movements. Much to the smuggler's surprise there were none.

Realizing that things weren't getting anywhere Han then sighed as he sat down and ran his hand through his hair in exasperation before looking back up at the man who had essentially made his life along with Luke and Leia's a living hell, yet without the suit and mask it looked like he was looking at a different person.

"I just want to know one thing though…why?" Han asked.

Anakin then sat into a meditative position opposite Han.

"It's a lot more complicated than what you know." Anakin pointed out.

"I've heard it all before from bounty hunters and other types of scum what their excuses were, so I seriously doubt that's the case." Han replied sardonically.

"Not this one." Anakin promised.

* * *

 _A very, very long while later…_

Han was still sitting opposite Anakin after hearing the whole tale, the former's face unreadable but inwardly he was mind-boggled in more ways than one.

"Can I just ask you somethin'?" Han asked once he came to.

Anakin nodded.

"Was everybody in that old Order chain-smoking deathsticks, or were they just born stupid?"

Anakin sighed. "It was a lot of things Solo. One of main ones was that they just didn't adapt for the times."

"That's an understatement." Han said with a huff. "And meanwhile you got the Emperor, who's got the entire Republic by the balls and was just waiting for the right moment to squeeze. And that Jedi code about having "no attachments"? Or even taking kids away from their families as babies with no thought given to the parents? I'm sorry, but what the hell was that organization anyway? And given that Old Ben had his own little thing going on with that Duchess from Mandalore, he was in no position to lecture _anybody_ , especially about having feelings for someone."

"Oh believe me, Satine's more than reminded him of that." Anakin said.

"Good." Han remarked. "So…even though she wasn't a Jedi, they're together in the Force?" Han asked.

"That they are." Anakin said.

"And your wife's over there too?"

Anakin nodded with a warm smile. How he was able to not be just fully redeemed but be reunited with his beloved angel after all he had done as Vader made no sense to Anakin whatsoever, but he long since learned not to question the Force's wisdom on what constitutes as justice and what doesn't, and to just be thankful.

For Han, it was still a whole lot to take in. For the longest part of his life he had thought like everybody else that Darth Vader was just some evil person who had no heart and was just a monster period. How Luke and Leia could come from him made no sense, let alone any woman seeing anything attractive about him, but now…knowing the whole story forwards and backwards, as well as in-between…it was definitely throwing him for a loop, even with all the crazy things he had seen in his lifetime.

Not only that, but it also shed a not-too-favorable light on the old Jedi Order and the system they went by. Even though Palpatine was able to manipulate things the way he did, the Jedi had indirectly helped him take over by staying stagnant, with Old Ben and Yoda being byproducts of that fallacy.

In a lot of ways, the blame could go around.

As for Anakin…well, while Han couldn't really overlook the things the other man did as Vader, the smuggler also couldn't label him as an outright monster, though part of him still wanted to. Plus, as Han began to mentally look at all the factors that led to Anakin falling to the Dark Side he reluctantly found that Anakin was more of a victim in the grand scheme of things.

 _Almost like Ben…_ Han thought.

"You don't have to forgive me if you don't want to." Anakin said. "Goodness knows, you and Leia more than have the right to hate me."

 _If I didn't know the rest of the details then yeah, I probably still would._ Han thought to himself as he looked at essentially his father-in-law. In a lot of ways it would be easy to say that if he had been in Anakin's shoes he wouldn't have made the choices the other man did. However…he didn't live the kind of life Anakin did. He wasn't taken from his mother at the age of 10; he wasn't saddled with a mentor who didn't initially want to train him; he wasn't treated like a pariah in an organization that had long since gotten shackled by their own code, and all the other things that followed from that. Essentially, it was the classic hero story gone horribly wrong.

What also seemed to jar Han was that he realized that if it had been him, he would've fallen way earlier than Anakin did. And a part of him hated that.

As Han looked at Anakin again the smuggler found himself unable to summon up the rage he initially felt when he realized he was talking to the guy who became Darth Vader.

"To be honest, I'm surprised you don't have a grudge against the old man since he obviously didn't tell Luke the whole story about you." Han said, deciding to change the subject rather than tell Anakin whether or not he forgave him.

"Well, to be fair he didn't know the whole story, even in death." Anakin said, not minding Han's sudden changing of the conversation. "Besides, I had more of an issue with him not telling Luke about his mother than the other stuff, but even _that_ I had to learn to forgive and let go, so…"

"Wait, so even as a ghost he wasn't privy to the whole thing?" Han asked.

"No, and that was by the Force's design." Anakin explained. "Even Qui-Gon was forbidden from telling him until Obi-Wan was ready to understand, and it wasn't until the end of the Battle of Endor that he was ready."

"When you threw Palps over the railing." Han guessed.

Anakin nodded as he then remembered Padme and Satine telling him of Obi-Wan's disbelief when he witnessed it. Even the former Duchess had laughed her head off when she saw the look of pure shock on her beloved's face and had a lot of fun reminding him of how little he and Yoda understood even at their age and experience.

"Okay, I'm just gonna go with 'born stupid'." Han said, to which Anakin just chuckled. And in spite of himself, Han found a smirk begin to cross his own face.

"Well…I guess we can sit here and chat for only so long before we get bored." Han said in his usual sarcastic tone after a while of being silent before getting up.

"So I take it you're ready to go then?" Anakin asked as he got up himself.

"Why not?" Han asked. "Besides, thanks to Luke I'm pretty much a believer now. Can't figure out how, but I am."

"Yeah, Luke has that ability." Anakin remarked proudly. "He got that from his mother."

Han then gave a slight chuckle as the two then began to walk towards the netherworld with Anakin leading the way.

As they walked Han couldn't help but be amazed. If someone had told him that a redeemed Darth Vader – no, Anakin Skywalker – was going to be waiting for him to take him to the afterlife he would've laughed and called the person insane, but yet…here he was, following someone whom he only knew as a villain, as an embodiment of pure evil, only to find out that the man was more of a victim despite his choices and actions, and that in reality he was someone who just didn't get a fair shake in life, and was treated more as a tool than a person – his mother and wife aside – but in the end, he sacrificed himself to save Luke, and by doing so fulfilled what it was he was meant to fulfill, and singlehandedly undid the Sith's plans…for a time anyway.

"I still wished I could've saved my son." Han remarked, his tough exterior melting a bit.

"He's not gone." Anakin said. "Not completely."

"How can you be so sure?" Han asked.

"Because I'm here." Anakin said. "My angel didn't give up on me, even though she more than had the right to, and yet even with dying of a broken heart she still didn't give up that faith. And that faith ended up living on in Luke, and despite all evidence to the contrary he didn't give up. Even when I told him on Endor that it was too late for me, he still tried to reach me, the part of me I thought I had destroyed long ago because of my own actions."

"And in the end…when I was lying there dying on that floor…that's when I realized Luke and my angel had both been right, and that they always had been."

"So yours and Leia's son – mine and Padme's grandson – is still there. Snoke hasn't driven his light away completely. He is a Skywalker as much as he is a Solo, which means there is a way to reach him."

"But who though?" Han asked. "If Luke couldn't do it, who can?"

"What about the girl you met during that little scuffle with those gangs you and Chewbacca were tied up with?" Anakin remarked with a knowing tone. "From what I can sense, she has the power of the Force too, as I have it, and Luke and Leia have it."

"Rey?" Han asked. "But she's a scavenger. She hasn't had any Jedi training."

At that moment Anakin wasn't sure if he should tell Han about the fight Rey just had with Kylo Ren, but a feeling from the Force prompted him not to spill those beans, or at least not yet.

"Training's important, but it's not the end-all-be-all." Anakin said. "If you open up to the Force – and I mean really open up – you can do the impossible, even give an opponent a nice slice of humble cloudberry pie."

"But what does that mean to 'open up'?" Han asked, incredulous.

"It means to find that center where there's emotion, yet peace; passion, but at the same time serenity." Anakin said. "It's not just one side or the other, but both. Jedis of old forgot what that meant, and Siths just flat-out don't want to understand that."

Right when Anakin said that, Han then remembered his son's emotional outburst when he tried to talk to him on the bridge.

"Despite how it looks, Ben is not beyond saving." Anakin said, trying to hide his own guilt. "One way or another, he can and will come back. We just have to trust and have faith in the Force. Snoke doesn't have the final say anymore than Sidious did, which is none."

Picking up on Anakin's tone Han then knew that the taller man was blaming himself for what happened to Ben, which Han more than did considering what he had said to Leia about Ben having Vader in him.

 _But then again, I didn't know the whole story._ Thought the smuggler to himself before realizing something…

"If you can appear to him like the old man did with Luke, then maybe…" Han suggested.

"Only if the Force wanted me to, and she doesn't. And with good reason." Anakin replied.

"What do ya mean?" Han asked.

"If I appeared to my grandson right now and explained everything, it won't dissuade him." Anakin explained. "In fact, the only thing that encounter would do is propel him to continue on his dark path even more, if for no other reason than to succeed where I failed." Anakin said. "So believe me, I'd like to, but this is something that someone else has to do. My time has passed."

"But what can Rey do?" Han asked.

Anakin then smiled. "Much more than even she realizes. And I know Luke will help her discover that."

Han was still not convinced, but then when Anakin spoke some more, a look of surprise and then realization crossed the smuggler's face.

"Just when I thought I had seen and heard everything…" Han remarked.

"It's called taking a step into a much larger world, Captain." Anakin said. "And it's never too late to do that, even here."

In spite of himself, Han couldn't help but chuckle.

"Oh and uh, Anakin?" Han asked after they walked a bit more.

"Yes?"

Han then gave a sigh before slowly extending his hand towards the taller man. "…Call me Han."

Anakin then looked at the hand for a moment, then he glanced at the smuggler's face for another moment before realizing what it was Han was _really_ trying to say.

 _I forgive you._

Despite having heard it from everyone he knew – from his mother, to Padme, Owen and Beru, his in-laws and nieces, Snips, and even the rest of the Jedi in the end, Anakin still felt a great sense of guilt and shame for his actions as Vader, but being offered forgiveness despite everything, and from a man he had tortured…it was something that still got him very emotional.

Calming himself down Anakin then reached for Han's hand and grabbed it firmly yet kindly.

"Han." Anakin said.

"Anakin." Han said.

Perhaps for the first time in a while both men felt more relaxed and Anakin didn't feel as much hostility from Han anymore. Of course, the fact that the smuggler was now starting to put everything together – mind boggling as it is – also helped.

"There is just one more thing though." Han asked once the handshake was done.

"What's that?" Anakin said.

"You called the Force a 'she', I thought she was an energy field, not a person."

Anakin then chuckled. "She is a lot more than what any of us can hope to fathom Han. Much more."

Realizing that there wasn't much more that needed to be said both men continued on their way to the netherworld of the Force, and once they got there Han would end up beyond amazed at what he saw, and more important he would end up meeting all the people connected with Anakin and then some. While it would seem like it would take a long time before Han would get to know everyone, it didn't turn out like that, for in the netherworld time was irrelevant, and what would seem like a long time would only be a heartbeat.

Although by shaking Anakin's hand Han had essentially forgiven the man, it would still take a while to get used to him as he really was and not the half-cyborg in the iron-lung suit he had come to know him as. However, as he hung out with them more – particularly with Anakin, Obi-Wan and their respective wives – Han would eventually make peace with Anakin completely, and he would see that in another time and place, things would have indeed turned out differently. Not only would Luke and Leia have known their birthparents and extended families, but Han himself would ultimately realize – with no more reluctance on his part – that he would have truly have called Anakin Skywalker…"friend".


End file.
